


after the storm

by captainskellington



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Poetry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-31
Updated: 2020-01-31
Packaged: 2021-02-25 14:55:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,071
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22497943
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/captainskellington/pseuds/captainskellington
Summary: Snippets of a poetry-journal written by Martin Blackwood, trying to arrange his thoughts and come to terms with his journey post-MAG160.AU where Martin kept up his poetry and got... better at it, I suppose. More confident, at least.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims
Comments: 3
Kudos: 22





	after the storm

**Author's Note:**

> *roman numerals = approximate episodes for each poem.

**i.**

i stare up at the sky and wonder who, if anyone,  
is doing the same. if elsewhere in the world, near or far  
some complete stranger is lost  
to the very same patch of blue, connected to me  
by some narrow thread of fate.

narrow, maybe, but i have little else. i do not  
recognise my daydreaming for loneliness;  
i mistake it for something poetic. but  
there is no creation here. i am trapped  
by the very life i hoped would bring freedom. a world  
of only knowledge — hidden, sought, discovered. 

in this world of searching, i am not found.  
never asked for, never considered.  
in a building full of eyes, all avoid mine. until  
one gaze, stubborn, lingers. a challenge.  
but at least, i suppose,  
at least he sees me. even if 

he does not like what it is that he sees. 

**xl.**

you know, i suppose, that it is possible to be alone  
even as friends stand by your side? (friends,  
maybe, but one day i will realise they too  
are trapped, victims of circumstance;  
they are no more free than i. if only  
we had all understood sooner.)

we know, now, there are things in the dark corners  
of the world that should never see daylight, yet  
so often do. i hide from them, and hesitate  
to stare into the sky as before. knowing now  
what gathered round me as i stood, oblivious and blinking  
in that glaring light of day.

**liii.**

the sky, at some point, has stopped being a comfort.  
and at the same time the earth beneath my feet  
no longer feels solid. where,  
if i cannot even trust the earth,  
am i supposed to stand?

something fragile is in the process of breaking. i feel this  
in the same way i feel the charged air before a storm.  
and like a storm, i know i am helpless to stop whatever  
is coming; know that i cannot protect  
those whom it endangers.

and i realise,  
i spent so long trying to keep myself together, that  
i never noticed those around me were fracturing, too.

(i realise, too late, he is every bit as lost as i am.)

**lxxx.**

she is gone. she is gone and none of us know until it is too late —  
too late for her, and too late for us and how,  
how could we not see it? we were so busy  
searching, probing into the dark that we forgot  
to examine the light. forgot to keep close  
what was really important. 

every turn i take seems to bring me further from the light and i  
am beginning to wonder if any of the doors i passed by,  
rather than through, would have brought me to someplace different.  
someplace brighter. or, if every decision was always  
going to lead me here.

maybe... it is too late for all of us.

**civ.**

it is something of a cliche, but i  
no longer fully understand where the line  
between right and wrong lies. whether  
there was ever really a difference  
between monsters and men

we realise now that we never really knew each other  
we are changing that, little by little. it may not be enough,  
it may be that nothing will ever be enough. i want to believe  
that anything is better than nothing but at times,

the bliss of nothingness is a sore temptation indeed.

**cxviii.**

you are feathers in the fog and laughter in the dark and i  
realise i love you again and again and i realise,  
in this i am again alone. but there is togetherness in this fight,  
and love is an endeavour worthwhile in and of itself. 

if my love will not be met equally, then at least it will be felt fully. 

and there is glee in rebellion, a joyful note  
in the cacophony of fear, the satisfaction of a lit match  
before it burns the tips of your fingers. it strikes wildfire  
into the soul of a friend who had always shone so bright  
i had never suspected his past could hold so much ash.

more than anything i am overwhelmed, by the beauty  
of knowing that, though the world is cruel and what we consider  
ours may soon end — by god, or by whoever may be listening —

at least we are alive to experience it. 

**cxx.**

your hand is cold to the touch, your eyes glazed over. and you  
are all that remains of the world i used to know  
but so little of you remains at all and

we have lost so much. buried so much. even those still standing  
are bowed under the weight of it all. i think, perhaps,  
i myself would not make for such a great loss.  
most who would care have already been taken  
so if i am the last to leave, if this all ends with me,  
who's to say it would not be for the best? and

i know that all i wanted was to be seen. but  
i see your blank gaze and 

i think, i think  
perhaps it is better  
to be invisible  
after all. 

**clx.**

i can still remember when your eyes  
slid wilfully past mine, when we  
were naive, in the wrong place at the right time  
when we did not know our lives were not our own,  
that they never had been; that we were chosen  
to be set aside and cast aside and abandoned  
aside and to be left alone. alone.

but then, it is you who refuses  
to let me go. you, who drowns the silence with your words  
who puts me back together when my pieces were so scattered,  
so lost. 

i don't know how you found me. i don't know how you, with hands so scarred,  
repaired the ropes i had frayed, severed.  
all i know now is, i am bound with string in red and rope in silver  
to you, to them, to any and all good that may remain in this world.

even if what remains is next to nothing, it is worth saving.  
even if i am nothing, i am worth saving.  
and if it is a web i am tangled in, at least it is one of my own choosing

i stare up at the sky once more, and for the first time  
it stares back. 

but i will not be lost again  
and i will not be the first to blink. 


End file.
